A Dragon's Choice
by moonrealm
Summary: When Eira impresses Bronze Kresenth 9 years before the end of the last pass how hard will she have to work to prove herself to everyone else. With the help of her friends L'nak and Tonam will she be able to succeed or will she have to give it all up and become a lone rider? Rated T just to be safe.
1. Fort Gathering

**AN: Hi fanfiction readers! I just cut out of one story to make this one, sorry! I was just obsessing over it too much and I NEEDED a break from it. Enjoy my story.**

**Disclaimer: **_**I don't own the Dragonriders of Pern series.**_

**Moonrealm**

_Gathering at Fort Hold_

I looked around the festive square and then stared down at my tattered clothes. They were faded blue and ripped around the skirt hem. I sighed and settled down with the other beggars; at least I wasn't as hungry as them.

Since I had eaten some fruit that had fallen off of a wagon as I trekked to the hold I only felt the beginnings of hunger gnawing at my belly. I had known that there was a gather by eavesdropping on the traders that followed the road here. And now I was somewhere warmer and safer than out on the road.

That was when the woman in the rich purple gowns walked right past me, her marks sack swinging back and forth like candy put just out of reach for a child.

I then stood slowly and followed her through the street. I was what was considered a master thief. I could take from almost anyone and they wouldn't notice. So, when the lady had stopped to view a bolt of rich red cloth but didn't look like she really wanted it I reached out quickly to grab some marks that were sticking out of the bag.

Unfortunately a boy had the same idea and our hands got tangled together in the leather pouch string. And before I could get them untangled from the belt strap the woman screamed, "Theives, Theives! They tried to steal from me. Someone grab them, quick!"

I then cursed and managed to loosen the strap enough for me and the boy to take off down the street. But a tall man had grabbed us before we could escape and bound our hands with a piece of cloth that the owner of the stall had handed him.

The boy was staring fearfully at the man and I rolled my eyes before I realized why, the man that had caught us was a dragonrider. As I contemplated what a dragonrider would do with thieves he spoke, "And what were you two doing, eh, a team of thieves? Is that what you are?"

I then looked him in the eye and said, "No, I never met 'im before in my life." I had decided to talk like I was a bit slower so that he would think I was a petty thief, not someone that could steal everything you owned.

He then said, "Really, is that the truth?"

The boy then finally spoke, "Yessir, it's the truth. I swear me life on it. I was just hopin' for some marks to buy some food with, you see."

The dragonrider then laughed and cut the ropes, "Well then, young lad, go on ahead," was all he said before he put some marks in the boy's hand and shoved him in the direction of the nearest food stall.

As I was watching him do this I had stood up and was sneaking off into the shadows when he spotted me, "Not you," he said, "I need to talk with you, missy."

I sighed; he had to have been fresh out of weyrling training. His cocky grin and gangly posture said so. "Fine, what do ya want mister," I said in my fake accent.

"I want you to come back to Fort Weyr with me," he said as he dragged me out of the square and out into the meadow right outside the hold.

That was when I saw her, the green dragon circling down into the field. I gasped; she was beautiful, the way her hide glimmered in the fading light.

"W-why me?" I asked , my accent gone, as we stepped toward the dragon. "Because Nath said you're special. She thinks that there's and egg waiting on the hatching ground for you," He then gave me a cocky grin and helped me onto her back.

Hello, young one, said a voice in my head."Ah!"

The grin fell off of of the dragonrider's face, "Wha-what's wrong? Are you alright?" had asked me.

"Um, yeah, she just talked to me, that's all," I said as I settled on Nath's back. "

That's all?" he said, "Not a lot of people can hear others' dragons, you know."

"Oh," I said as he shot into the sky.

I panicked at first, I had never been on a dragon before, and wrapped my arms around the boy's waist. Though, as we climbed higher, I realized that I was holding on to him and let go, blushing. My blush disappeared when I looked out over the sky and saw Fort, tiny down below.

He then looked back at me and said, "I apologize, I never told you my name. I'm L'nak."

I blinked to clear my mind and said, "Eira, my name is Eira."

He smiled, "That's a nice name. Hold on!" he said.

I looked back at him and tightened my grip, "Why?" was all I got out before blackness engulfed me. I didn't panic; I just sat there, on nothing. There was nothing; no L'nak in front of me and no Nath beneath me.

We reentered the regular world and I saw it, Fort Weyr, stretched out beneath me like a perfect picture that the machine, The AIVAS would have shown them from Earth. I smiled, something I hadn't done in a while, and L'nak turned around and smiled back, saying, "I hope you like it!"

I nodded and Nath touched down on a ledge that led to a large cavern.

I then stepped off Nath and realized that I was shaking and hungry before I fell to the floor, hearing L'nak yelling as my vision went black.


	2. Fort Weyr Hatching

**AN: Apparently I'm a better writer than I thought. This story has a bunch of people that get sent emails when I post so yay! So if anybody reading this likes Hunger Games I have another fanfiction that has more chapters at this link: s/8147267/1/Is_there_another_way . I would have posted earlier but the internet connection broke where I was so sorreeeee everybody. **

**Moonrealm**

_Arrival at Fort Weyr_

When I woke I was laying on a bed with a quilt covering me. And as I sat up I saw that I was in a small cavern lit by candles that casted moving shadows on the wall. I had also noticed that there was a person sitting next to the bed, though I couldn't see who it was because my vision was foggy. And as I looked closer at them my eyes grew accustomed to the dim light.

I didn't know them but they looked friendly enough. It was a boy with a kind face that had golden curls framing it. He was asleep with his head on his hand and I laughed quietly to myself, he reminded me of my cousin that I hadn't seen in so long.

My chuckling woke him up and he sat straight in his seat, looking around the room. When he noticed that I was awake he smiled and stood up before stretching his hand out to pull me up. I gratefully took it and held my stomach, the hunger pangs in it almost unbearable.

The boy noticed and laughed for a moment before handing me a tray that was on the table, it had a bowl of thick wherry stew, a large slice of bread, and a cup of klah on it. I nodded gratefully to him and took it, eating as I sat back down on the bed.

As I sat and ate he looked over at me and started talking, "I'm Tonam," he started, "I heard that L'nak brought you in on search, too. You're Eira, right?"

I nodded at him and thought for a moment before swallowing and saying, "What do you mean, too? I thought that L'nak only found me on accident."

Tonam laughed again and spoke again, "No, no, Nath, L'nak's dragon, can sense if people have the potential to impress a dragon. It was no accident that he found you, he was drawn to you. He told me that it was like a pull he couldn't ignore. He has feelings that he can't explain towards you, Eira, and he has only just met you."

I stared at him, shocked that he was telling me such personal things about L'nak and shocked that L'nak would tell him these things to begin with. "Why would L'nak tell you about how _he_ feels toward someone that you don't even know," I finally said with a disbelieving look.

He laughed again and started chattering, "Because he's my half-brother! He came looking just for me when he went on search," he pointed to his chest and smiled before continuing, "He knows I'll be a dragonrider, just like him! I want it more than anything else in the world!"

I had finished the food by now, as I had been eating some every time Tonam had been talking, and set the tray on the table, nodding at his explanation. "I barely even know anything about dragonriders other than the fact that they destroy thread," I confessed to Tonam.

He gave me a toothy grin and said, "Well, there's a bunch of dragon eggs on the hatching sands waiting for the right people to be there and impress them," he changed the subject for a moment, "They think that the eggs are going to hatch soon, too, so you'll have to go wash up and put on some candidate clothes after we stop talking," he went back to his original subject, "But, Eira, there's a special egg on the sands, you see, a gold egg. It's gonna hatch a queen and L'nak and Nath think that you can impress her! Wouldn't that be amazing?"

I smiled down at the slightly shorter boy and nodded slowly, I also noticed his height at that moment and thought of how he couldn't have been older than 14 or 15 turns, but that's when a rider ran in and said to me, "You need to get ready fast if you want any chance at all in the hatching."

And then our conversation ended with Tonam saying that the bath was through the cavern and that there were candidate clothes next to it before running out to change into his own candidate clothes.

When I stepped into the bath cavern it was steamy and warm. The water just seemed to draw me in and it was as if I had to drag myself out immediately out of it once I had thoroughly cleaned myself up with soap-sand since the hatching was likely to happen any minute. And I soon learned that it was a good thing that I had gotten out of the bath when I did because there was a thrumming sound that started vibrating the stone of the dead volcano as I pulled the white tunic on over my head.

I had then finished pulling it on and ran out of the cavern, onto the ledge outside of it. Fortunately, a dragonrider had spotted me and landed, yelling, "Get on!" Once I had gotten on he took off and we landed at a small entrance that he shoved me inside before he took off into the sky for other passengers.

In the cave there were a lot of people around my age, 16 turns, and some younger and older. Ranging from 14 to 24 in age we were a very odd mix, though it looked as if we all had Fort Weyr territory heritage. I was the most Ruathan looking but I barely thought about that because they were then ushering us in, telling the girls to surround the gold egg.

The hatching sands made my feet hurt but I was too caught up in the moment to care. There was excitement pulsing through me and I knew that I was going to do something special. I was going to impress, I felt it with every fiber of my being.

As the eggs started hatching people found their dragons, there were cries of joy and happiness as they did so. But, the girls were still waiting. That queen had yet to appear. I had apparently spoken too soon, though, because the queen egg was hatching, splitting into a million little shards.

I had shaken my head back and forth as she broke out of her shell, this was not my dragon, and then I had stepped into the circle of boys as if there was a magnet pulling me there. Tonam was standing at the center, trying to attract a little bronze to him. The bronze had very different ideas and ducked away from Tonam, swiping.

The little guy got in a lucky hit and slashed a shallow score in Tonam's arm, making him yell in pain. That was when I lunged forward and scooped up the dragonet, scolding him for cutting my friend.

But, when he crooned pitifully I gave in and told him, "It's alright, Kresenth." as I called for food and carried him over to the edge of the grounds.


	3. After the Hatching

**AN: I was working on my HG again but now I'm back to add another chapter to Eira's story. So, please keep reading and reviewing. I'm also taking so long because I was on vacation and I didn't take my computer.**

**Moonrealm**

After I impressed Kresenth and had gone to the edge of the hatching ground L'nak saw me. He ran down to me, as he had been handling the meat, and congratulated me before he saw my dragon. Very few had seen me impression because the queen had been swarmed by the girls at the same time and they were still trying to get her to come to them. She would have none of it and jumped into the stands, where her chosen human must have been. By the time she had done so I was at the edge of the grounds, watching.

Everyone watched her for a while until there was a cry of joy and a woman, probably around 19, ran out of the stands cooing to the little dragon in her arms before she got some meat to feed her with. L'nak watched for a moment more before turning back to me and remembering that I had impressed a bronze dragon.

"H-how di-did you i-imp-impress a b-bronze dr-dragon?" he stammered as I stroked the gorging Kresenth's back.

I knew nothing about dragonriders so I just cocked my head and asked, "Is that unusual or something?" He was still shocked and I asked a little more nervously, "Did I do something wrong, is it bad for me to impress a bronze dragon?"

L'nak looked down at me and continued without stuttering, "It's not necessarily _bad_. It's just that no female candidate has ever impressed a male dragon."

"Oh," I said, more confident now that I knew I hadn't done something wrong, "But, you impressed Nath and she's female, isn't she?"

L'nak nodded and continued, "Well yes, but…"

"You don't have any reason for why you could impress Nath that wouldn't mean I couldn't impress Kresenth," I smirked before rubbing it in a little more, "Do you?"

L'nak was about to admit defeat when a tall man with broad shoulders and curly hair walked over to us. L'nak looked startled and stammered out a hello to Weyrleader N'ton.

I gasped, this was N'ton, the weyrleader of Fort Weyr was standing right in front of me. Fortunately there was a smile on his face and he didn't seem angry in the least. He just asked my name and told L'nak that he wanted to meet with us both later before patting Kresenth and walking away.

_Eira, I'm tired now_, said a little voice in my head. I jumped back a bit before I realized that it was Kresenth talking to me.

Not knowing where to take Kresenth to sleep I turned to L'nak and said, "Kresenth says that he's tired. Where do I take him?"

L'nak looked down at me and replied, "You should take him to the Weyrling Barracks," When I looked at him like I was pretending to know what he was talking about he said, "I'll take you there, follow me."

As I got Kresenth to follow me we started trekking to the cave where the barracks were. Once we were there the weyrlingmaster, a retired brown rider named C'yon, came to greet L'nak, who was apparently his friend. When L'nak told him what had happened with my impression the old rider furrowed his brow and looked at Kresenth and me. After commenting on how odd it was that I had impressed a bronze he told me that I could stay in the girls section of the barracks with the new queen rider.

I nodded and went down the hall that he had pointed to with Kresenth. A little ways in I found the new queenrider and her dragon. She was putting a few belongings in the chest at the foot of the bed. No other girls had impressed at the hatching so there was an empty bed and dragon couch on the other side of the room. It was a rather large room, obviously meant for a gold dragon but I could tell that within a few months we would need separate rooms to give our dragons space.

When the girl noticed me she smiled and looked behind me to see my dragon. When she did her smile quickly turned into a frown because she could only see the outline of Kresenth, she must have thought he was a gold.

"I thought that there was only one gold dragon. She's surely too big to be a green," she said to me in with a noble accent, a holder's accent.

I gave her a small smile and said to her, "Yes, there was only one queen egg. And yes, **he** is too big to be a green."

She gave me a startled look and said, "He? But, you're a girl! You can't have impressed a male dragon!"

"If men can impress green dragons then why can't women impress bronze dragons?" I asked her with a smirk.

"Because it simply isn't done!" she cried, "Women are only supposed to impress female dragons." She then sat down on the bed, thinking over what I had said about green dragons.

"Well, what's done is done! One can't change the past," I told her before I got Kresenth to lie down on the couch.

Once our dragons were asleep me and my roommate, Ania, daughter of some miner holder, went to the lower caverns to eat. When we got there Ania ran straight to her family, who congratulated her.

After she left me alone I looked around the cavern and found Tonam sitting with L'nak and what must have been the rest of their family. They were saying how sorry they were that he hadn't impressed. I walked over to the table and put a hand on his back.

He felt it and turned around to look at me. When he saw that it was me he smiled and told me how glad he was that I had impressed. I felt sorry for him and reached into my bag that had come with me, taking out a drawstring pouch about the size of both of my hands put together. "Here," I said, "I don't need this now. I, ummm," I searched for a word that didn't imply that I stole it, "found it."

Tonam slowly took the bag from me and opened it. His eyes grew wide as he pulled the small egg out. "A fire-lizard egg," he said.

I smiled at him and nodded. I had felt so bad when I stole the dragon that he was trying to impress. But, I never had been able to stop stealing. When I looked around for a moment I caught eyes with L'nak. He silently mouthed the words "Thank You" before my eyes flitted away.

**AN: Thanks for reading everyone. I really appreciate it.**

**Moonrealm**


	4. First Day in Fort Weyr

**AN: Okay, I'm back for another chapter, because this is my most, and only, reviewed story. So, keep up the R&Ring.**

**Disclaimer: Dragonriders of Pern does not belong to me.**

**Moonrealm**

The day after the hatching I was just waking up when L'nak arrived at the barracks for me. He gave me a little time to change into some decent clothing and to oil Kresenth before he rushed me over to my meeting with the weyrleaders.

When we arrived N'ton was waiting. He stood when he saw us and gave us a smile.

"So, Eira is it?" he asked me.

I nodded to the weyrleader's question and he continued, "You impressed a bronze dragon, didn't you?

I nodded again and said, "Yes, sir."

"Eira," he said to me, "You don't need to be afraid, no one is mad at you," he then continued in a lighter tone of voice, "In fact, last night the other weyrleaders and I discussed what to do about your certain situation and we think that you should choose for yourself."

"Choose what for myself?" I asked him.

He smiled and answered, "Choose if you want to try to become a full-fledged fighting dragonrider or if you want to learn the basics and see what else your skills would be needed for, like work on the southern continent.

"Oh, um," I looked at L'nak for a moment and finished, "Can I think about it?"

N'ton nodded and told me to go to training and L'nak to go do his duties before threadfall that afternoon.

I arrived just in time for training and saw Tonam sitting on a rock outside of the barracks, he held a sleeping brown fire-lizard in his arms and was rocking it back and forth, cooing to it. He noticed me mid-coo and sprang up, running over to show off his new pet.

"Eira!" he cried, "This is Ronto, my fire-lizard."

I laughed at the awkward little creature that was trying to balance and find a way to nap on Tonam's arm at the same time. It heard me and turned its little head. "Sqwa?" it said before reaching its beak out towards me.

"Why hello there," I said to Ronto as he allowed me to scratch his eye-ridge.

Ronto chirped at me before jumping back to Tonam when C'yon came up behind me and said, "Would you care to join the rest of us, Eira, or would you rather play with Tonam's pet?"

I turned around quickly and gave a weak smile to the older rider and the annoyed looking boys behind him. "Oh, ah, yes. I'm sorry for keeping you waiting."

C'yon just nodded and motioned for me to follow him and the boys back to the open space where he was showing them how to take care of their dragons until they were old enough to fly properly.

I tried listened carefully to C'yon's instruction to make up for the fact that I had arrived late, but the three boys behind me were repeatedly tugging at the back of my tunic. When I had finally had enough of it I turned around and told them to knock it off but the oldest one of them just laughed and said, "What are you gonna do about it? You're just a girl trying to be something you ain't."

I glared at them again and whipped back around before I heard Kresenth talking to me in my head, _Eira? Are you alright? You seem agitated, should I come out and help you?_

I smiled to myself and replied mentally, _No, Kresenth, I'm fine._

My dragon's voice then went silent and I could tell that he had fallen back asleep. So I went back to listening to C'yon, the boys behind me had finally grown bored with bothering me.

After about seven more hours of training, with a lunch break about four hours ago C'yon released us for dinner. It was only five o'clock but the work I had done had made Kresenth and me hungry so I took him to go get something to fill his stomach before I ate.

It didn't take us very long to find Kresenth some food and a place where some sun still remained for him to sleep in. So, once he was comfortably scratched and oiled I ran to the lower caverns to find myself something to eat.

Once I had gotten my food I found L'nak and Tonam and sat down with them. There was a pretty blond woman sitting next to L'nak so I asked him who she was.

He looked at me and replied, "This is Takira, she came for the hatching. We were betrothed before I became a dragonrider."

I dropped my spoonful of stew back into my bowl, shocked that L'nak was, or had been, betrothed. It made me feel strange to realize that L'nak must have romantic interests. Though, from the way he was reluctantly putting his arm around the young woman, she wasn't one of them.

L'nak frowned when he saw my expression and Takira looked annoyed when she saw that all of his attention was not focused towards her so, to get it back she said, "Oh, yes, it was tragic when Lenarrik became a dragonrider. It ended all hope of a relationship between us!"

"Oh, ah, yeah. It was terrible. And Takira, haven't I told you that my name is L'nak now?" he replied as he looked down at his plate.

"Of course, silly me! I'm always forgetting," she said before she turned to glare at me and Tonam, "Don't you two have somewhere else to be? I'd like to catch up with Len, if you don't mind."

Tonam rolled his eyes and motioned for me to follow him to the empty table in the far corner of the cavern. I got up and told him to lead the way, clenching and unclenching my fists as I trailed after him.

"Soooo, what did you think of Taki?" Tonam asked me as we ate at our little corner table.

I looked at him and replied, "She doesn't seem very nice. Why would she want to marry L'nak anyway?"

"Oh, well, that's a long story," he said before he sighed and continued, "You see, Takira was betrothed to our older brother, half-brother for me, Tarrik. Tarrik was first-born so he would inherit all of our father's land, he bred horses. But Tarrik and our father got into a huge accident about five years ago, killing themselves and a few horses in a barn-fire. It left Takira without a rich future husband and L'nak and my half-sister Nerine orphans, since our father's first wife had died giving birth to Nerine about ten years before the accident," he paused to tear off a piece of bread to eat and wash it down with fruit-juice, "So, after our family had recovered from the loss, Takira's father approached us with a new offer, since the first-born of our family was dead L'nak would inherit the farm, therefore the agreement would stay the same, the only change being that L'nak would marry Takira, not Tarrik. But Takira was disappointed again when L'nak impressed Nath, it made her think that L'nak didn't even like women in the first place, which is completely wrong. So she tries to cling onto a relationship with him, even though it will never happen."

I nodded as I took it all in. So, L'nak didn't like Takira in any way. I didn't know why but it made me happy to know that, it relieved the jealousy that I had been feeling for what I thought was no reason.

Tonam then looked at me and asked, "So, I told you some of my story, why won't you tell me something about your past?"

I shrugged at him and said, "Maybe some other time, Tonam, maybe," as I got up and walked out of the cavern, headed to pick up Kresenth and go to bed.

**AN: Okay, chapter done. Hoped you liked it!**


	5. Fort Weyr Bullies

**AN: Okay, so, I'm back. I'm really sorry for not posting or anything but,****unfortunately, life has to go on even when we don't want it too. I think that my writing has improved recently, though, so maybe there is some benefit?**

**Also, I would like to thank all of you readers out there for reviewing and following; it really helped me get my head back into the game.**

**Moonrealm**

I woke to Ania shaking me. She looked annoyed so I sat up and asked her what she wanted.

Ania sighed and said, "We have to get up and care for our dragons."

"Oh," I replied as I stood and pulled on my tunic, feeling Kresenth's hunger from where he was waking.

Once I was ready, we headed out of the barracks and went to find some food for our dragons, and for ourselves. It didn't take us long to feed our dragons, and take care of their flaking skin, so we headed to the caverns to find something suitable for us to eat while they slept in the sun.

We were soon sitting at a small table in the corner with Tonam, who was rubbing his eyes and yawning. Ronto was curled around his neck, asleep.

Feeling bored as we sat there, I decided to start a conversation, "So, Tonam, how was dinner after I left?"

"Fine," he replied as he sipped his juice and scratched Ronto's head.

"Oh," I said as I stood to put my plate with the others to be cleaned, "Well, I had better be off before I'm late for training." I nodded to them and quickly walked out of the cavern and back towards the barracks, where the bullies from the day before were waiting.

The oldest boy stepped towards me and said, "Hey, look, it's the girl that's trying to be a bronze rider."

His friends snickered behind him and I glared at them, saying, "So what? At least I managed to impress a bronze, what did you manage, blues?"

The younger one of his cronies stepped forward and said, "Yeah, so what? At least we'd actually destroy some thread; you'd probably be too scared to do anything but get yourself hurt!"

The other one laughed at his friend's words before I said something rather insulting and spat at the ground next to their feet.

They looked at me before shutting up. Their leader, who the insult had been directed at, rushed towards me, pushing me into the dirt before he tried to punch me. He missed as I dodged his blow and fell down face-first next to me. I quickly stood and ran to the barracks as fast as I could, trying to escape my attackers as they yelled after me.

I finally stopped when I ran into C'yon; he grabbed me by the shoulders to stop me and waited for me to stop panting before speaking. "What happened, Eira? Why are you running?" he asked me as we sat.

"Z'lan and his cronies were bullying me, and I teased them back, so they tried to attack me," I said to him.

"Really," he stroked his beard, "They shouldn't be bullying you like that, even if you have a stronger dragon," he then stood, "Go along to the barracks now and clean that dirt off, I'll take care of them."

"Thank you, C'yon."

"It's nothing, this kind of behavior can't be allowed to happen," he turned back to me, "And Eira, just let me handle this, alright?"

"Fine," I told him reluctantly.

C'yon nodded and walked off toward where I had come running from.

**AN: OK, a short chapter, but it's something. I hope this will do for now, I'm not quite as loaded down with all of my papers now, so I SHOULD be updating more.**


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